


Willow - A Spellster Short Story

by AldreaAlien



Series: Spellster Series [1]
Category: Spellster Series
Genre: Dwarf, Elemental Magic, Evil Tree - Freeform, Gen, Magic, Prisoner of War, Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-29
Updated: 2016-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:29:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24382081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AldreaAlien/pseuds/AldreaAlien
Summary: Ylva, a young dwarven woman, is captured by the enemy and comes face to face with their most powerful weapon.
Series: Spellster Series [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1760614





	Willow - A Spellster Short Story

The oar dipped into the lake, disturbing its calm veneer with the faintest of splashes. Pitched back and forth by the horrid rocking of the boat, Ylva shuffled on her seat. Her shoulders ached at the strain of being bound like some felled deer. A small mercy she no longer felt the coarse bonds digging her into flesh. She flexed her fingers, or at least hoped she had, they'd gone numb sometime midmorning, when they'd entered the lakeside village.

If only her captors would loosen the ropes. What did they think she would do? Jump into the water? Bound or no, it wasn't as if she could swim. _What if I fall overboard_? Her stomach flipped at the thought, threatening to expel this morning's meal. Surely they wouldn't let her death come so easily. Not to her. Not after they'd brought her all this way.

Biting her lip, she fastened her gaze on the castle before them. Trees and bushes screened off much of the structure, leaving its sole tower as the only properly defined formation. She wouldn't have cared if the hump of ground had held nothing more than a tent or the treetop houses of home. Its purpose would've served the empire well enough as bare land.

 _Land_. How she longed to once again set foot on it. Her soul ached for that simple union far more than for her home. She was born to be surrounded by the gentle sigh of the forest and the murmur of the life it bore. No such luck here. Trees there may have been, but they stood enclosed by brick and mortar. The wild hemmed in their idea of civilisation. _And water_. Sitting in the cupped palm of a dale, it stretched out from either side of the boat for what might as well have been leagues.

Her captors—these humans who enslaved all in their path—hadn't allowed her the simple freedom of touching the earth beneath her feet for nigh on fourteen days. She'd been borne here on a cart driven by the very men flanking her. Back then, they'd carelessly dumped her amongst the grain sacks. Now they were close to their destination, the men had gained a wary edge. Only the hulk of human muscle rowing their small vessel seemed at ease.

The boat rocked like a wind chime in the breeze. Wavelets lapped at the sides with sickening slaps, sharply reminding her of raw meat on a cold pan. She shuddered, her stomach cramping. No way to forget they headed towards an island. The _Gilded Cage_ these people called it. A perfect prison. _The savages_. Ever mocking what they didn't understand. Even here, in the heart of their burgeoning empire.

The prow bumped against the landing with a hollow thunk. Deft hands swung the boat around, slamming the side up against the weathered planks. The pier creaked, its wood, both dead and alive in the fresh water, had been left to scream in its half-submerged agony. She cringed at the cry. Did these people not hear the torment they inflicted? How could they be so deaf?

Strong hands grasped her arms, hauling her to her feet and onto the pier. Ylva staggered across the short platform, her steps growing stronger as the earth neared. Her foot landed on the ancient stone stairway leading away from the water's edge. Vigour returned anew, seeping up through the worked slabs.

Behind her, in a flash of blue and white, the boat slid out into the water. Did they think she'd only now attempt to escape? As if she would consider returning to that empty shell they dared to call a vessel. She'd much prefer to slip under the lake's green surface and never emerge again than to endure another trip like _that_.

The men led her up the short flight of stairs and through the remains of a stone archway still strong enough to loom over them. The path beyond lay shadowed by trees. Bushes stirred in her wake, their shivering branches bending towards the trio and back again. Her presence noted and passed on. A message that was invisible to the brutes who guided her.

Along the gravel path they went. Her escort hurried her onwards, their unease a fine musk. She smiled. Better if they'd had the foresight to strip this place of all life. Although, legend said that even in the most barren of lands, the soil alone could, for a time, lend its strength to one in need. Stretching her mind for the first time since her capture, she brushed her senses against the dirt and frowned.

The island was troubled.

High above, a tree creaked its mournful greeting. _Caution_ , it warned. The cry was taken up, flitting from branch to branch like a sparrow, until it came from all around her.

Through the hiss of the wind-rattled leaves, she caught a glimpse of the things they'd seen. Of the prisoners who'd gone before her. Dwarves from nearer clans, their land swallowed by the greed of the Udynea Empire. They'd been brought to this place just as she was now, leaving only when they'd been beyond broken. Their souls, both those of the strong and the weak, shattering against the cold, unhearing slab of the empire's will.

 _Why_? the trees asked, their voices a delicate echo of each other. _Why have the elders allowed another of their people to be given over to the Silence_?

"Them trees," the smaller of the two men mumbled. His ears had a curious pointed shape. One of these elves from across the big water to the west? "What are they doing?"

"It'swat they always do around the Folk." A meaty finger prodded her back, arching her spine and sending a fresh wave of pain through her shoulders. " 'Ere, missy. Make'em stop."

With her teeth clenched, she continued her measured pace in the waiting quiet. No point trying to explain to these oafs that she'd no control over what the trees chose to do. Dwarves lived alongside nature, knowing her movements as deeply as the animals. That the humans confused it with magic spoke only of their shortcomings. It would be simpler trying to rule the earth and its seasons than to get a single tree to obey any sort of command. Even in the artificial forests the empire's people built to span the hole in their souls, the trees held more sway than any mere creature could hope to attain.

The castle suddenly appeared through the trees, a hideous monster of brick and glass looming over her. Its open maw of a doorway beckoned them forth. Ylva lifted her head and squared her shoulders. The joints ached far too much to protest the movements. She was strong. A hedgewitch of the High Circle. The most revered among the clans for leagues around. She'd show these earth-deaf heathens they could not break all of her people.

She stepped into the courtyard to be greeted by a call she hadn't noticed lingering on the edge of her senses since she'd first set foot on this island. Its cry subtle, yet piercing to the soul.

Ylva sunk to her knees. Tears streamed down her face in sympathetic resonance. _How_? The empire's people were deaf. Blind. Their leaders were rumoured to have strange magic at their control, but they could not have done this. It should not be possible.

But there it was. Despite all rationale, it sat hunched in the centre of the yard like an old man. She peered through the leaves, long tendrils that brushed the cobblestoned ground, their ends twirling in the breeze. Beyond the branches bent in their eternal grief to the trunk they'd cruelly twisted and bound in the iron they dared to call a fence.

They had _tamed_ a willow.

She shivered. Unlike the trees at her back, living in what small measure of the true wild this island could claim, there was no such whisper from the willow. An echo did sit where there should have been that natural zest. It sucked at the world, yearning to fill the hole these savages had ripped in its core.

Just as keenly as its kin, the tree felt her presence. Its leaves shook a vigorous welcome. Gleeful as a sapling after the first winter. Too long did they keep it cooped. No company. Little room to grow. Nothing from which to feed.

Vines hovered on the edge of her vision. Old enough to have climbed as far as the castle roof. Older than the tortured thing before her. _And dead to the root_. No spark of life lurked along the whole length of the bare wood. The very air felt heavy. Used.

Jumping to her feet, she spun to flee through the archway. Beyond, the trees creaked and swayed as if in some unseen storm. _Faster_ , they cried. _The Silence draws ever nearer_.

The men grabbed her. She struggled against their grip, their pawing fingers tearing at her shirt. The paved ground underfoot rolled, cracking as it valiantly sought to aid her.

Behind her, the willow screamed. _She could not leave_.

A hand hooked under each arm, the men lifted her into the air. They hauled her closer to the willow. Away from her freedom. She watched as the gates, their thick wooden panels deader than the stone surrounding it, swung shut.

More men, wearing shirts made of iron loops and carrying hunting spears taller than themselves, stood before the exit.

"Come now, missy," said one of her captors, his voice rasping in her ear. "Don't you Folk _like_ trees?"

She shook her head. Never had she come across a tree like this one. They were the stuff of nightmares. Horrors of legend. The elders would've ordered the burning of a tree like _that_. Burnt the wood to ashes and salted the earth so nothing could return.

Something hit her mind like the crack of a whip, slamming her consciousness with the speed of a serpent.

She pushed back, desperately trying to keep her attacker at bay. _Too late_. It wove through her senses, coiled about her mind like choking ivy. Then, in one swift snap, her ties to the earth were gone. Each connection severed in a heartbeat. Shutting her off from the world she'd always known.

The men released her, letting her slump to the ground.

It was gone. She cocked her head. The wind whispered as it slid through the leaves of the willow. But where there had once been words, there was… nothing. _Silence_. A breeze that she'd been able to understand since infanthood had become as muted to her ears as her own breath.

The willow creaked, its leaves slowly swaying from side-to-side.

Her tears renewed, blurring her sight of the twisted tree. She caressed the ground, a finger tracing the cracks in the stones. The ground that had reared in aid so readily a moment ago now lay still. She could hear nothing of the world. Not even the willow! This could not be. She was of the High Circle. The _strongest_ of her clan. And they'd taken it. _Stolen_ her very essence from her.

She lifted her head and screamed at the sky until she'd barely the breath to live. The sound split into twin echoes of despair and anger. They twirled about the confines of the courtyard, bouncing off the vine-shrouded stones only to gradually fade away.

Leaving naught but silence in its wake.


End file.
